8 November

Today is National Harvey Wallbanger Day

So we are drinking a...

Harvey Wallbanger

Of all the cocktails to have its very own day, the Harvey Wallbanger is probably the most surprising. But, yes, Harvey Wallbanger Day is a thing in American. And Harvey Wallbanger Cake is a thing, too.

A much-maligned 1960s drink, the Harvey Wallbanger comes a little before the Sex and the Beach, the Woo Woo and the Snowball on many veteran bartenders' lists of drinks they least like to serve. We reckon that's down to the quality of their orange juice. Because, made with freshly squeezed juice, the herbal flavours of Galliano [be sure to use L'Autentico and not Vanilla] come to the fore, making this one drink worth celebrating tonight. So dust off that little-used bottle, break out the juicer, and try our own take on a Harvey Wallbanger.

The day an asteroid narrowly missed the Earth

This day in 2011, at 11:28pm, the cutely-named Asteroid 2005 YU55 passed less than the moon's distance (330,000 km/200,000 miles) from Earth. Next day, on 9th November 2011, it passed even closer to the Moon.

NASA was at pains to point out that there is no danger of an earth collision within the next century, which is handy since the dark object is around 400m across.

2005 YU55 is too small and too fast moving to be observed with the naked eye, although amateur astronomers rejoiced in the visitor and hoisted their telescopes. We are toasting this particular near miss, not to mention the technology which enabled astronomers to predict its trajectory, with a Comet Cocktail, an elegant, classical blend of cognac, Drambuie and lime originally named after an aircraft.